Public, sidewalk pay toilets are a common sight in many European cities. The facilities are generally accepted and are considered an excellent way to meet the demand for accessible public toilets. The move in the United States to incorporate the toilets in the major metropolitan areas, on the other hand, has been slow at best. However, recently there has been efforts to find some form of answering the demand for accessible public toilets in the United States. Major cities such as New York and San Francisco have already begun or planned pilot projects with the sidewalk pay toilets.
The sidewalk public toilet is a facility which must be able to respond to a variety of demands and site restraints. The problem with present public toilets is that the sanitary units produced are relatively large and use too much precious sidewalk space. Many of the units (such as the unit disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,301,558) are little more than small rooms installed on sidewalks. Generally, a section of a sidewalk, which may be narrow or already crowded, must accommodate a public toilet facility which is the size of small automobile. Some of the more creative designs for automatic public toilets (such as the sidewalk facilities in France designed to look like a kiosk) are not handicapped accessible, and are often still too large for a many sidewalk areas. This kiosk-type of design would not conform to the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Often, prior art public toilet facilities use a porcelain or polyester toilet bowl that retracts into an equipment compartment for spraying and/or brushing. After the cleaning cycle, the toilet bowl and seat may have droplets of liquid on their surfaces. Although the bowl and seat were probably thoroughly disinfected, the liquid left on the bowl or seat gives the impression of uncleanness. Some of the newer facilities have dryers that blow on the seats and bowls, but these dryers are inefficient.
On some models the bowl itself is similar to a motorized bedpan and does not have a hole for immediate waste disposal. There is a need for a more aesthetically pleasing way of presenting the toilet bowl and seat and disinfecting the toilet bowl and seat. In addition, a need exists for a way of providing immediate waste disposal siphoning from the bowl.
Many of the larger sidewalk toilet units (such as the unit disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,301,558) are divided into two volumes: one volume for users and an equal or larger sized volume for equipment and machinery. There is a need for a unit which more efficiently uses sidewalk space and which more compactly provides needed equipment and machinery.
Most prior art public, sidewalk toilets use prefabricated concrete for the user compartment and a weight sensing metal floor. This type of design gives many people the impression of walking into some kind of large urinal. This impression is reinforced by the humid condition of the interior after the cleaning cycle (such as the cleaning cycle disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,301,558). Also, because of insufficient ventilation of the user compartment, odors have a tendency to linger. There is also a tendency, because of the closed-in nature of the devices, for garbage to accumulate in the user compartment. There is need for more sanitary public toilet facility which can overcome these problems.
The public toilet units that are being designed at the present time include integral concrete bases and walls and therefore are quite heavy. The units, therefore, are not easily movable to other sites if the need arises for a large number of the facilities to be assigned to a certain sector of a metropolitan area. Weight is not the only characteristic that makes the facilities difficult to reassign. Many times the utilities wiring and plumbing extend throughout the facilities and are not easily disconnected. Even if the utilities can be disconnected, there is no good way to cap the utility leads.
Because of the difficulty of reassigning the prior units to different locations, municipal governments are forced to use portable toilets which do not have immediate evacuation of waste or facilities for a lavatory. These portable toilet systems do not offer the hygiene that the sidewalk public rest rooms afford. The toilets also require regular service by pump trucks, which is not only inconvenient and labor intensive, but also puts the units out of service for a period of time. There is a need for a public toilet system in which the facilities are reassignable so they may be put in high traffic areas or event areas and can be designated to certain spots during different events or times of the year.
Another problem with prior public toilets is that they offer little privacy. When the door opens on the prior devices, anyone passing by sees the toilet and the person going into the unit. This tends to make the user self-conscious and embarrassed. At night when the door opens, the shiny toilet bowl is visible to all and a flood of lights spills out on the street announcing to everyone that the user is entering a public toilet. Although many Europeans are less concerned about such discretion, the idea of using a public rest room on the sidewalk in a major metropolitan area seems very foreign to most Americans. The large, utilitarian units offered in the past reinforce Americans phobia about toilets. A more attractive, less imposing design may increase acceptability of the facilities in the United States and ultimately determine their success or failure.